Mr. Luis Berrios, who claims he and his partner was subjected to abuse—both verbal and physical—while being arrested in December of 2010, appeared today in court for the first day of trial: Berrios vs City of Philadelphia.
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The right leg of Mr. Luis Berrios—a gay Latino man who today in Center City Philadelphia at the start of a civil trial in federal court against local government (two police officers in particular: Mr. Robert Taverez and Mr. Michael J. Gentile) testified before an all-white jury about a December 2010 encounter with police that left him with nerve damage in his upper body—shook uncontrollably prior to entering the courthouse at 6th & Market Street. The young man wore nervousness on his face as it if were the thick beard that grew from his chin.
Luckily, Mr. Berrios, age 32, had a swath of friends and allies there with him. At 8am, the group convened in front of the James A. Bryne Court House and accompanied the Northeast Philadelphia resident into a third floor courtroom where he—in an effort to sue the City of Philadelphia—would have to face the officer, Mr. Gentile, who he claims—in addition to calling him a faggot and Mr. Jason Mendez, his then partner, a nigger—put handcuffs on him so tightly, and which caused such pain, that Mr. Berrios struck his head multiple times against the windshield of a car in an attempt to be knocked unconscious.
“This type of police terror is not just happening here, but around the world. We need more of these cases to enter the courts, we need the courts to overflow until they can’t handle it,” said Mr. Emanuel “Mani” Martinez, an activist, prior to the trial.
“We’re fighting a Goliath, but we have Davids all around here and we have enough slingshots to knock this system down today. We are going to stand with this brother, even if it means taking it to the streets. No justice, no motherf*cking peace,” Mr. Asa Khalif, head of the Pennsylvania chapter of Black Lives Matter, said.
The trial began with the plaintiff’s attorney, Ms. Rania Major, detailing the historical mistreatment of minorities by police and the egregious name calling that went on in her client’s apartment in late December after the police were called to intervene in a domestic disturbance. The attorney for the defendants objected both times and, during his opening statement, stressed to the jury that this was a case about “excessive force,” so even if the officers did use racist and homophobic slurs, it’s not relevant.
Mr. Khalif disagrees.
“The words fueled a lot of the physical interactions we heard about today,” he told Techbook Online in an exclusive interview following a 1pm lunch break from the court. “The fact that they were a same sex couple absolutely contributed to the hate that was directed towards them.”
Mr. Berrios, when being questioned by his attorney, said initially when the cops arrived on the scene, he told them that his partner was his brother because he was afraid of how they would respond to him being a gay man.
While believed to be a heterosexual male, Mr. Berrios said he felt somewhat safe when talking to Officer Tavarez, also a Latino man, who was questioning him as to why he hit Mr. Mendez in the head with an iron. Mr. Berrios claimed self-defense, saying Mr. Mendez, after completing almost an entire bottle of cherry vodka on his own and suspecting him of chatting on the phone with another man, began acting irrationally, and that behavior soon morphed into violence.
The defendants’ attorney, of course, told a different story, one where the house upon arrival was in disarray—an aquarium broken with little turtles crawling around the floor—and Mr. Mendez appeared disheveled and quite possibly on PCP (angeldust).
Mr. Berrios, the defendants’ attorney said, kept trying to interfere in the arrest of his partner, who eventually needed medical attention because of the amount of brute force used and blood lost.
“It looked like a massacre,” Mr. Berrios said, describing the scene in the back of the police cruiser.
Mr. Berrios, in contrast, refused medical treatment for his injured wrist once he had been arrested because he thought—after hearing a female officer at the station say that for this disorderly conduct charge a citation, not an arrest, was warranted—that he’d be able to visit a hospital on his own, once released from police custody.
But that night he wasn’t released, instead, Mr. Barrios claims, he was handcuffed to Mr. Mendez and shipped to Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility, where he stayed for a day until being bailed out.
Just the sight of police nowadays triggers panic attacks for Mr. Berrios, who, for his anxiety pain and other ailments that are the result of trauma, takes several types of medication, including Prozac and Depakote, a mood stabilizer.
After the arrest, Mr. Barrios said normal activities like scrubbing the home or masturbating were impossible because his right hand would often go numb.
It was visibly difficult for Mr. Berrios to disclose such personal details during the trial, but he knew going into today that he would have to open up and tell his story for the many like him who couldn’t.
“I may not be able to break this system, but I’m going to put a dent in it,” said Mr. Berrios prior to the trial.
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